The peri-urban zone in Tesistan and the process of the Guadalajara's metropolization

Abstract

The generalized scope of urbanization as a successive and unidirectional transformation of landscapes and societies from a rural to an urban state is increasingly questioned. This article develops the process of rururbanization of the peri-urban zone, taking the city of Guadalajara as a case study. The terms with which this strip of land is approached carry within them a stigma or developmental charge. It is an area that clearly reflects the changes resulting from urban expansion and, at the same time, exerts a significant influence on the agricultural sector and natural resources. This region constitutes an extension of the city that comprehensively encompasses and connects economic, demographic and environmental aspects. As a result, it is argued that the regionalization of the AMG as a political project of the city does not follow a clear trajectory that regulates urban growth and expansion in a forceful manner. The planning of the peri-urban zone requires, as a starting point, the establishment of differentiated normative criteria between consolidated urban zones and those in the process of rural-urban conversion, characteristic of the periphery.